


The Greatest Poet who Ever Lived Can Be Such an Ass Sometimes

by major_general



Category: Elizabethan and Jacobean Theatre & Literature RPF
Genre: Espionage, Fanboying, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-20
Updated: 2015-12-20
Packaged: 2018-05-07 20:03:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,695
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5469275
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/major_general/pseuds/major_general
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Let Kit Marlowe tell you about the most interesting man he ever met.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Greatest Poet who Ever Lived Can Be Such an Ass Sometimes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [arrogantemu](https://archiveofourown.org/users/arrogantemu/gifts).



Two playwrights both alike in age and hairline but actually not much else. No, wait. Shall I compare him to a flea, both are annoying and cause…no that’s not it either. There once was a man from Stratford... No. 

Perhaps I should just say that I first met Shakespeare at a performance of _Tamburlaine_. I was watching from the back, trying to see what the audience liked so that I could do it again in the sequel. I noticed him immediately. When someone is that focused on something you wrote, you pay attention. And when that someone is as comely as Will was at 25, well, I didn’t see much of the play or the other people in the audience. I did get a sense of what he liked though. He hung on Ned’s every word and seemed like he was trying to memorize the speeches. So I didn’t completely fail in the task I set for myself. As the crowd let out of the Theatre, he lingered staring at the stage and lifting his arms as Ned had done. Clearly, he’d been moved.

“How did you like the play?” I asked, going for casual inquiry.

“It was wonderful. The way words can evoke such a feeling of…And the music how it…I’m sorry, I’m having trouble saying what.”

“Obviously it moved you.”

“Yes. I think I could do better though.”

“Better than whom, the actors or the writer?”

He sighed. “Probably not the actors. I try, but I’m just not as impressive as Mr. Alleyn.”

“Few are, but you shouldn’t count yourself short.”

With a smile, “That’s nice, but you’ve never seen me act.” He stuck out his chin. “But I can write. I can’t do much else, but people like what I write. I figure, if I can get a company to put on one of my plays, I could maybe get them to let me be a bit part in it.”

“Why ever would you want to be in it?”

“Why wouldn’t you? You can’t tell me that after watching that that you don’t want to be up there.”

“Yes I can.”

He looked back at the stage. “I don’t believe you.”

“You should. I’m Kit. Let me buy you a drink and you can tell me all about why you think the theatre is the life for you.”

“Will.”

He said that he’d tried his hand at teaching and that he just didn’t feel like he was any good at it. He said he had trouble with it but didn’t elaborate. He’d tried being a sailor and gone abroad but he just couldn’t stand being on boats. His father had been a glover and alderman, but that he didn’t have the skill for the one nor the connections for the other. The drunker he got, the more he insisted that he knew he could write better plays than any he’d seen. He was going to make a name for himself and he was going to be able to feel how much the audience loved his words when he was standing there behind Ned saying his words. It was around the fourth drink that he mentioned the wife and three children back in Stratford. So it looked like I had made a new friend. At the sixth drink, I finally told him who I was.

“Fie on you, you son of a toad!”

He took it rather well, especially after I told him I could probably get him a position with the Admiral’s men.

My star was on the rise, you see. As long as Ned was drawing the crowds he was with my Tamburlaine, I could get them to do a few favors.

Will did well and managed to make a way for himself. Companies started putting on his work as well and letting him stand in the back with a spear or something. And though I shared my space with Kyd, I was soon showing all my work to Will and he was doing the same. Will would come to our room and show us his work and read through ours. Sometimes Tom was there, sometimes he wasn't.

“You see it’s funny because no one would actually want to go lie on rocks and look at sheep.”

“Aye, I just don’t think people are going to get it. There are a lot of people who make their money off of sheep and they would take this seriously. If you want it to be a joke, you’ll have to be a bit more blatant.”

“You’re wrong. People will see this is ironic.”

I was actually the one who was wrong about that one.

“So then he takes her sons and he serves them to her as pies.”

“Dear God, Will. What are you trying to do to the audience?”

“Oh, they’ll love it.”

Some of them did.

“This line, this one’s brilliant. Tom, did you read this?”

“Yes, Will, I read Kit’s poem.”

“Just listen to this bit again. ‘Whoever loved that loved not at first sight?’”

“Yes, Will, it’s great.”

“It is. What are you working on?”

Really, he came to be the best collaborator I had. He just wasn’t the kind I wanted. As Will did everything to get onto the stage, I did everything I could to get back in the good graces of Walsingham. Sure the fame and renown were fantastic, but nothing had ever been as good as the work I’d done for the Crown. How can you top it? 

I’d messed it up years ago. I tried to get other scholars to think that I was going to defect to Rheims and they reported me instead of confiding in me. I guess there were no secret Catholics there after all. But after the Privy Council had to inform Cambridge of my loyalty, I wasn’t wanted as a spy. No one would trust me, they said. I don’t have to go abroad as Kit Morley, I said. They still were unwilling.

I don’t know if it was just my eagerness to get back into service, but suddenly I started noticing things about Will. I caught him walking on the Strand one day headed towards St Paul’s. He said he’d been visiting his mother’s cousin but wouldn’t give the name or say exactly where he’d been. He didn’t actually attend any church from what I could find, but I also could never find him on a Sunday morning. He always said that he’d been sleeping it off in a ditch and that I’d found him just when he’d sobered up enough to wander back to his rooms.

Then I started to notice it in his plays.

“Will, you have to stop.”

“What?”

“They are going to catch you.”

His breath caught. “Look, my wife is back in Stratford and a little dalliance with a young man is…”

“Not that. Wait, you?" I shook my head. "Not the time. Will, look at this. Right here. Look at what you’ve written.”

“You don’t like it?”

“Why is King John giving a speech about how bad the Catholic Church is?”

“So, I thought people would like that.”

“He’s the villain, Will. If you write things like this,” I could see his face start to blanch, “they’ll know.”

“Know what? That the Catholic church is corrupt?" He looked me in the eyes and whatever he saw made him drop the act. "There’s nothing to know.”

“Are you looking to be drawn and quartered? Or maybe you’d like them to burn you?”

“You don’t know what you are talking about, Kit.”

“I do. Believe me, Will. I do.”

“What are you saying? Are you?”

“Oh, no. No. I’m barely even a…”

“How would you know then?”

“Hasn’t anyone ever told you about me?”

“Well they’ve told me a lot of things about you.”

“You aren’t the only one Hob thought was not good enough to be performed.”

“That’s ridiculous. You are one of his Corpus—”

“Greene didn’t think I earned my degree. I did, but I wouldn’t have gotten it if my employers didn’t intervene and say that I should get it because of my service.”

“Service?”

“In Paris. For the Queen.”

He dropped his papers.

I rushed over and picked them up. Putting them in his hands, I said, “I’m not going to turn you in, Will. Just be more careful. Hide it better. Keep it out of your work if you can.”

He sat down in my chair. “I’m sick of hiding. I shouldn’t have to hide it. It’s what’s right.”

“No, Will.” I put my hand on his shoulder. “It’s not.”

He looked up at me with such a glare. “Promise me.”

I knew what he wanted. “I’m not going to tell anyone.”

“On your soul. Or at least what's left of it, with all the blood you probably have on your hands.”

“No one.”

He left in a quiet rage and never really spoke to me again.

I want to say we left it better than we did. I kept trying to get him to see me and talk to me. He’d leave the tavern when I entered and started working with the Lord Chamberlain’s men more. I just couldn’t get him to realize that I was on his side. _His_ side, at least.

Then I got the notice. The Privy Council wanted me back. They needed assurances that I wouldn’t get caught or raise suspicions. It was going to take more than a simple promise. I knew it had to be done. Sadly, I was not able to reconcile with Will before I “died.” And poor Tom, it's a shame what they did to him so that everyone would think I couldn't possibly be their man. 

I never got to talk to either of them again. I did appreciate the part in _As You Like It_ , though. He did not get any better at hiding his papist beliefs. I’m just amazed he managed to get away with it. I may have been unable to keep myself from shouting during a performance of _Measure for Measure_ once. I’m pretty sure Will thought he saw a ghost.

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Yuletide, arrogantemu! I hope you like this. I tried to keep it light, but got so excited when I got the idea for the plot. Recent scholarship supports the theory that Christopher Marlowe was a spy for the Privy Council during his time at Cambridge working on his Master's. Recent scholarship has also argued that Shakespeare was a secret Catholic. I just needed to put these together. I hope there is enough talking about and going to plays for you and that Yuletide is everything you wanted it to be.
> 
> Thanks to my beta, d.


End file.
